Fiction Completes Us, Mutilated Beings Burdened With the Awful Dichotomy of Having Only One Life and the Ability To Desire a Thousand

C. S. Lewis? Mario Vargas Llosa? Louis L’Amour? George R. R. Martin?

Dear Quote Investigator: Although each individual is limited to a single life on Earth, he or she may vicariously experience a thousand lives via novels and movies. This notion has been expressed by some prominent writers, e.g., C. S. Lewis, Mario Vargas Llosa, Louis L’Amour, and George R. R. Martin. Would you please explore this topic?

Quote Investigator: In 1961 noteworthy fantasy and theological author C. S. Lewis wrote the volume “An Experiment in Criticism” which included a passage about inhabiting many fictional selves. Emphasis added to excerpts by QI: 1

Literary experience heals the wound, without undermining the privilege, of individuality. There are mass emotions which heal the wound; but they destroy the privilege. In them our separate selves are pooled and we sink back into sub-individuality. But in reading great literature I become a thousand men and yet remain myself. Like the night sky in the Greek poem, I see with a myriad eyes, but it is still I who see.

In July 1984 Mario Vargas Llosa published an essay titled “El arte de mentir” (“The art of lying”) in the Spanish newspaper “El País”. 2 “The New York Times Book Review” printed a translated version in October 1984. 3 Below is an excerpt in Spanish followed by an excerpt in English. Llosa argued that the thoughtful reader of a novel achieves a transference to a new identity in a different realm:

The transfer is a metamorphosis—the asphyxiating constriction of our lives opens up and we sally forth to be others, to have vicarious experiences which fiction converts into our own. A wondrous dream, a fantasy incarnate, fiction completes us, mutilated beings burdened with the awful dichotomy of having only one life and the ability to desire a thousand. This gap between real life and the desires and fantasies demanding that it be richer and more varied is the realm of fiction.

Below are additional selected citations in chronological order.

In 1989 Louis L’Amour published a memoir titled “Education of a Wandering Man”. He eloquently expressed a similar idea: 4

It is often said that one has but one life to live, but that is nonsense. For one who reads, there is no limit to the number of lives that may be lived, for fiction, biography, and history offer an inexhaustible number of lives in many parts of the world, in all periods of time.

In 1990 Vargas Llosa’s commentary caught the eye of quotation collector Jon Winokur who included it in the compilation “Writers on Writing”: 5

A wondrous dream, a fantasy incarnate, fiction completes us, mutilated beings burdened with the awful dichotomy of having only one life and the ability to desire a thousand.
Mario Vargas Llosa

In 1996 the compilers of “The International Thesaurus of Quotations” included an entry for the remark of Louis L’Amour: 6

For one who reads, there is no limit to the number of lives that may be lived, for fiction, biography, and history offer an inexhaustible number of lives in many parts of the world, in all periods of time.
LOUIS L’AMOUR, EDUCATION OF A WANDERING MAN (1989)

In 2011 George R. R. Martin published “A Dance with Dragons” which is part of the fantasy series “A Song of Ice and Fire”. One of his characters highlights the multiplicity of lives accessible via reading: 7

Bran did not understand, so he asked the Reeds. “Do you like to read books, Bran?” Jojen asked him.

“Some books. I like the fighting stories. My sister Sansa likes the kissing stories, but those are stupid.”

“A reader lives a thousand lives before he dies.” said Jojen. “The man who never reads lives only one.”

In conclusion, these four creators crafted distinct valuable expressions that overlap in meaning. C. S. Lewis’s comments were published first. Yet, QI believes earlier instances of this sentiment exist.

Image Notes: Illustration of book opening to reveal a fantasy world from Iván Tamás (thommas68) at Pixabay. The image has been resized, retouched, and cropped.

(Special thanks to Eugene Heller and Jonathan Weinberg. Heller told QI about the Mario Vargas Llosa quotation in “El País” after he saw the QI entry about the George R. R. Martin quotation. Weinberg told QI about the C. S. Lewis quotation from 1961 after he saw the initial version of this article which began with the Vargas Llosa quotation.)

1984 October 7, New York Times, Section: The New York Times Book Review, Is Fiction the Art of Lying?, by Mario Vargas Llosa (Translation by Toby Talbot), Start Page BR1, Quote Page BR40, Column 3, New York. (ProQuest) ↩